To the uninitiated, Lee Iacocca, the son of an Italian immigrant, worked for Ford for thirty years, rose from the ranks to get the Presidency and then was unfairly fired by Henry Ford II in the mid 1970s. He and his team were responsible for Ford's Mustang and Mark III, which helped Ford keep within distance of General Motors the giant in the field. But then the eccentric Henry Ford (who's literally runs the company to his whims) fires him and tries to humiliate him publicly as he gets too close to the 'crown'. Lee has the option to take this lying down but he chooses to get even. He joins Chrysler the third and last player in the auto game, which is on the brink of being declared bankrupt. He assembles his dream team from his colleagues at Ford (some of which he had to fire himself as per Henry's orders). He then does a 'Rocky Balboa' to bring Chrysler back from the dead with the K-Car. The most memorable newspaper cartoon (some clippings are included in the book) is a Chrysler car coming out with all cylinders firing from a grave.The book touches on many things like the recoil on his personal life, the rise of mediocrity, the discriminatory policies, the smart Japanese turning US into a colony of sorts, bureaucratic bullshit, turning into a public figure with his innovative commercials, and more. You see some mind boggling figures in this book being moved about like change. e.g. one of his lines "$1 million is like small change in the auto-business."
In short, a real life grim fairy tale. I enjoyed reading Iacocca's autobiography.
I found Iacocca to be a very practical guy, working with figures and doing what needed to be done without regret. Move fast and decisively and as he says there are no free lunches.
Here are some quotes from the man himself. http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/l/lee_iacocca.html
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